UFC 109 preview: Fight of Mark Coleman's life just another challenge for Randy Couture

LAS VEGAS – Mark Coleman and Randy Couture have 91 years between them when they step into the octagon for the main event of UFC 109 this Saturday. But the former champions are in two completely different places in career arc.

Couture (17-10 MMA, 14-7 UFC), 46, is a five-time UFC champion and a promotional institution. He’s seen more big-time fights than anyone, and he’s been at the highest levels of the sport longer than anyone else. He’s not going anywhere unless he says otherwise.

Coleman (16-9 MMA, 7-4 UFC), 45, is a three-time UFC champion from the “human cockfighting” days of the promotion and the author of a once-dominant style. He’s admittedly let the sport pass him by to raise a family. He hasn’t truly beaten a top-name opponent in 10 years. A victory over Couture could give him his 10th life in the fight game.

“Personally, there’s a lot on the line for me,” Coleman said. “[It’s] just by far the biggest fight ever.”

The event takes place at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, and it marks the first time two UFC Hall of Fame inductees meet inside the octagon.

The bout is significant because Coleman and Couture are anomalies in MMA; most fighters expire, so to speak, in their mid-to-late 30s. This past August, Couture signed a new seven-fight deal that could conceivably take him into his 50s. He’s done anything but take it slow; instead, he booked three fights in six months. Coleman returned to the UFC this past January at UFC 93 after a nearly two-year absence and looked every bit his age. But he delivered a stunning rebound – the product, he said, of a focused training camp – at UFC 100 when he defeated Stephan Bonnar in an upset victory.

They are both comeback kids.

But Couture fights more out of enjoyment than necessity. He has leveraged his celebrity into a variety of successful side businesses. Coleman, on the other hand, said he is only able to focus on one thing and needs a paycheck. “The Hammer” has a lot more to lose – and a lot more to win.

The two were supposed to meet 12 years ago at UFC 17 on May 15, 1998, when Couture rode high after stealing the heavyweight belt from Maurice Smith five months prior. Smith had broken the aura of ground and pound by taking Coleman’s belt in July 1997.

Couture, as it turned out, was in the infancy of his development; Coleman was at the apex of his.

In all likelihood, the fight would have been a simple question of whom could get top position and pound the other out.

But the showdown was not to be. Couture had to pull out of the fight when he popped a rib preparing for an international wrestling competition and flew the UFC coop 10 months later when the promotion refused to honor his contracted pay. He then served a two-year stint in Japan.

Coleman became a huge star in the MMA-obsessed country at the turn of the millennium and later lost ground to the well-rounded fighters of modern MMA. Couture returned to the UFC and became one of its biggest stars while winning and defending heavyweight and light heavyweight titles eight more times. Along the way, he picked up striking skills to complement his wrestling background. He’s had 23 fights to Coleman’s 17 since the missed meeting.

Will this fight be any different than the predictions issued 12 years ago?

“It’s always interesting and intriguing for me to face another wrestler, a guy with a similar background with a similar style,” Couture said. “If you put your wrestling to the side when you’re facing a guy like Mark Coleman, you’ve made a mistake. There’s no doubt Mark’s used his wrestling very diligently and won a lot of fights with his wrestling. He uses that as a tool to win fights.”

Couture has brought in several collegiate wrestlers to help him prepare for Coleman’s style and has rededicated himself to jiu jitsu, particularly his game on the bottom and in transitions, with coach Neil Melanson.

Coleman, meanwhile, has recruited Couture’s former striking coach, Shawn Tompkins, to beef up his striking attack and monitor his overall game. Coleman and Couture insist there’s no fodder for controversy in Tompkins’ move.

Coleman does not promise to pull a rabbit out of his hat on Saturday. Coming in shape and ready to go is enough.

“I want to go out there and perform and put on a good show for the fans, and that’s critical for the sport and important to me to please the fans because they’re the ones paying [for] tickets to watch the fight,” Coleman said. “Of course I want to win, but most importantly, I want it to be a good competitive fight, and I hope there are some good bruises on both of us.”

And whoever gets that top position will have a lot of them.

The Chael Sonnen show airs Saturday

What’s gotten into Chael Sonnen these days?

The clean-cut middleweight and future politician has always been a straight shooter, but he’s downright stolen the spotlight from Nate Marquardt leading into their co-main event bout with a series of tirades directed at many of the sport’s sacred cows.

Sonnen attacked middleweight champion Anderson Silva, Mark Coleman and every fighter who’s ever entered the octagon feeling prepared and ready to execute a gameplan. Fighting is simple, he has said. The MMA world complicates things.

Although Sonnen is mad as hell and not going to take it anymore, he’s thrown zero flack in Marquardt’s direction. Marquardt, the former King of Pancrase, is just too nice a guy. But Sonnen sure has gotten people talking about their fight now.

“My opponent, on paper, wins this fight,” Sonnen said Thursday at the UFC 109 pre-fight press conference. “But ladies and gentlemen, we’re not fighting on paper. We are fighting on a blood-soaked canvas with a UFC (logo) in the middle of it. And he can bring his better striking and better grappling, but we will see who the better fighter is on Saturday night.”

Marquardt, playing Vinny to Sonnen’s Snooki, had a good laugh at the podium speech and said he paid little mind to the hype.

“He’s a very good speaker,” Marquardt told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) after the press junket. “He’s got the fans pumped for the fight. It’s cool. He’s exactly right. On paper I win this fight, but a fight’s a fight.”

UFC president Dana White confirmed that the fight will determine the next challenger to the middleweight title. Current champion Silva attempts his sixth title defense against Vitor Belfort at UFC 112 in April.

Sonnen breathed new life into his UFC career in his most recent performance when he shut down Yushin Okami – the only current UFC fighter to hold a victory over Silva – for a unanimous decision victory at UFC 104. The showing wowed White and earned Sonnen the title-eliminator slot when Dan Henderson defected to Strikeforce this past December.

In earlier stints for the UFC and WEC, Sonnen has struggled to find consistency inside the cage. Submissions are his kryptonite; a brilliant turn against Paulo Filho was soiled when he left himself exposed to an armbar in the final round of their WEC middleweight title fight in December 2007. After getting revenge on the Brazilian a year later, he was railroaded when Abu Dhabi champion Demian Maia submitted him with a triangle choke at UFC 95 this past February.

Marquardt, in turn, knocked out Maia in 21 seconds this past August at UFC 102 and earned his title-eliminator ticket.

Marquardt, who runs High Altitude Martial Arts and often works with famed coach Greg Jackson, has lost but one fight since a failed bid at Silva’s middleweight title in July 2007. His victory over Maia was his third consecutive win by strikes.

Marquardt’s prowess, however, is the least prominent storyline leading into Saturday night. Sonnen has turned down the sound on all other fights.

The Oregonian may be surprised Saturday to find a Bud Light logo in the octagon’s center.

Serra vs. Trigg a “loser leaves town” fight?

Welterweights Frank Trigg and Matt Serra admit they are in the twilight of their careers. But if one of them can speed the other’s retirement? Bonus points.

The cocky Trigg (19-7 MMA, 2-4 UFC) of old has been quieted by recent showings. After a knockout loss to Josh Koscheck this past September at UFC 103, it is do or die for the former University of Oklahoma wrestler.

The 37-year-old Trigg has flirted with retirement in the recent past and said he returned for one final push to prove he is competitive with the sport’s current stars.

He twice fell short to nine-time UFC champion Matt Hughes at the apex of his career and served a four-year stint in outside promotions such as PRIDE, ICON Sport, and World Victory Road’s Sengoku event series, and he won the ICON Sport middleweight title in 2007.

It’s this or Starbucks, Trigg said.

Serra, too, has hinted at calling it quits after two consecutive losses to former welterweight champion Matt Hughes and current 170-pound champion Georges St-Pierre.

In April 2007, he became the “Rocky” story of recent UFC history when he defeated St-Pierre at UFC 69 to claim the welterweight title after winning “The Ultimate Fighter 4.”

UFC president Dana White said Thursday that the loser of the bout could find himself with a UFC pink slip before announcing retirement.

Historically, submissions are Trigg’s Achilles’ heel. Serra, a Renzo Gracie black belt, stands to exploit that trait. On the other hand, Serra has struggled with strong wrestlers who outsize him.

UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey is probably the greatest female fighter on the planet, which is a tremendous feat. So why are we seemingly so obsessed with arguing about whether she could beat up men?